30. Mount Saint Helens (V)

She snapped her fingers, and the floor fell out from the bottom of the world. He felt down a long dark tunnel; the world receded before him, shrank to a circle of light, then nothing.

What the fuck?

He tried grasping, clawing at something, anything to hold onto, even threw a Chain. He hit nothing. There was nothing but the dark. Then the tunnel opened back up suddenly in brilliant color. Sensations flooded him. He was falling through open air. The wind, cold and fast, ripped at his cheeks, stung at his eyes, roared past him as he fell flailing, trying to get a grip. Above there was only blue sky. Below, he saw a vast plain of rolling green—far, far below, half-hidden swaddles of cotton white clouds. Clouds he was falling toward at alarming speed.

Not great.

So she'd teleported him. But how is it possible? You weren't supposed to be able to leave the dungeon before it was cleared. This wasn't the dungeon… did her Signature Skills let her bypass the laws of this world?

That didn't feel right.

All these new sensations rushed at him, over his skin, through his eyes, ears; he even smelled the crisp freshness of the air. But that was all they were. He blinked. Something about this—once he took the time to look, and not feel—felt off.

Uncanny valley off. Everything felt slightly unreal, lost in the jumble of feelings until he stepped back and paid careful attention.

That horizon… it didn't look as far off as it should. He summoned his Axe and shunted it out, smoldering with twin Laws.

It hardly went a couple of hundred feet before it met some resistance— and tore through it. There was a tear in the fabric of the sky. On the other side, he saw gray clouds over black trees.

Made sense. So this was constructed. Some kind of artificial space. Like a living mirage. He checked out his other acts and ripped another long gash. It started leaking violently, loudly. That tear seemed wide enough to fit him. He planted the axe in the soil outside, and yanked.

He flew tumbling out, coughing. That little trick kind of gotten him for a second there. He couldn't say he was excited. His heart was still going pretty steady, but he was at least stimulated.

He turned to face Avery with her arms crossed. "What the hell! You got out of that way too fast."

"It was a good trick," he said. "It felt mostly real. Was it meant to scare me?"

"... Pretty much."

"There's your issue," he said. "I don't do that." But he could see how people could fall for it. He looked back at it. From the outside it was a shimmering ball of essence, a swirling cocoon. It slowly broke down, faded out.

"Okay, tough guy," she said, frowning. "Well that was only level one. That was a pocket mirage. It's pretty much a fancy cage. Small, annoying to get out of… but try this!–" She snapped her fingers, and she started to warp.

Her skin flushed deep red. Horns sprouted from her head, her mouth grew fangs, and on and on she grew, thickening with slabs of muscle. Giant bat-wings sprouted from her back. Her eyes burned like flames. A devil Titan floated before him, dwarfing him, gripping a spiked flail whip. It grew to the size of a skyscraper and must be visible for miles. He knew it was an illusion intellectually, but his eyes couldn't find any cracks in it. It seemed real. The Titan roared, and the earth shook. The gale-force of its torrid breath made him stagger, almost swept him off his feet.

"Kneel, heathen!" it said in a voice like shredding metal. "… No? Nothing?" The evil giant sounded disappointed.

"I mean… it's neat," he offered.

The giant looked sheepish. "Well, anyways. Difference here, it's not just you experiencing this, it's everyone."

She shrank back to normal human size and sighed. "Your mind doesn't seem very blown."

"I can see how it's useful," he said. "You could make enemies think you're not there. You could show them feints. You could trick them."

"Yeah, it's useful, but you're not... bleh. Alright, I'm done showing off. Let's get back to finding that stupid Brimstone Drake."

About half an hour back in their search, he had a thought.

"You said you fought this leader of the Iron Legion."

"Yeah, Marcus Blackwell, he beat the shit out of me. It sucked."

"How strong is he?" said Zane. "Compared to me."

Avery gave him a weird look. "Honest?"

"Yes."

"... He could probably beat you in under five moves," said Avery, wincing.

He nodded slowly.

"And this… Soldier of God. He's coming for me."

"Yeah. And he's got a lot more lackeys like Stroud, too. He was a higher-up in some private militia. He had tons of ex-military buddies. They took really well to the Change. And they're all in like the 50s and 60s. So… woah."

"What?"

She blinked. "That's the first time I've seen you smile."

***

It was sundown, and they still hadn't found that Brimstone Drake.

Avery might have her Laws and her mirages, but Zane was still yet to be convinced she was worth much as a tracker. Even she was starting to get embarrassed. "I swear I'm usually better at this," she said for the fifth or sixth time. They'd walked the same loop twice.

"I don't understand," she mumbled, "it's a Drake, they're meant to be super rare. Drakes, really any dragon-type monster, their lairs usually have hoards. There's like five or six Bosses worth of treasures in there, sometimes stuff you couldn't get anywhere else. And like a mountain of mid-grade essence stones."

"Mid-grade?"

"Mid-grades have ten times the amount of essence that's in normal essence stones—the stuff you trade with the Beacon. Like. It should emit a huge essence signature. Why can't we feel it?"

She shook her head. "It should be here… Makes no sense. My Law works with vibrations. I can usually feel these things hundreds of feet away. These bosses, they should make big tremors but…"

She chewed her lip. "We're missing something. I'm missing something."

The waning sunlight cast the land in red and black, the color of dying hearths. It was looking like they might have to make an ash-bed or something. Find a way to stay the night.

They passed by another essence geyser. This one was just overflowing with lizards. They loafed all over in their dozens, soaking in the pale light.

Avery followed his gaze, and…

"…wait," she said, "No. Is it that obvious? Those Lizards always around essence pools…. we should be able to sense the hoard and its essence, but we can't…. the geysers are constantly erupting… I should be able to sense the tremors, but I can't…"

She groaned, palming her face. "Oh my God. I swear I'm not usually this thick."

He caught her drift. "Wait. You're saying—"

"They're down there." They stared at each other. Then together, a little breathlessly, they strode toward that pool.

First thing Zane did was clear out the basin. He sent his Axes spinning there and back, there and back again, and by the third time, there wasn't a lizard left.

They marched toward the middle where the geyser spewed out. Avery knelt, put her palm against the ground, and closed her eyes. For a few moments, she was silent. Then her eyes snapped back open. She nodded.

"Yep. The vent opens up. There's a tunnel down there." Zane tried finding it through the billowing essence. It was like staring down a well of fog.

Something was climbing up his back. He almost squished it until he realized it was her. She pointed at the wall. "Okay, you can go down now. … What are you waiting for?"

He thought about flicking her off and making her climb herself, then just sighed, found a foothold, dug his fingers into the slick tarred stone, and started hauling himself down.

The deeper they went, the thicker the mist, until he could hardly see his own fingers. "How much farther?" he grunted.

"Almost there!"

Then he reached a point where his foot caught nothing but air. He glanced down, saw something vaguely shiny. Ground? He let himself drop.

They stood in the middle of a natural tunnel steaming with ghostly white essence. The ground was uneven. Obsidian crystals blanketed it, stretching up the walls, the ceiling, clustered so tight he could hardly see the porous black rock beneath. The air smelled of burning, of sulphur.

He stepped.

Crunch. He froze.

That crunch… it sounded just like…

Those were not crystals, were they?

He identified them.

ℕ𝕠𝕔𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕖 𝕃𝕚𝕫𝕒𝕣𝕕 (𝕄𝕠𝕟𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣)

𝕃𝕧. 𝟜𝟘

ℕ𝕠𝕔𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕖 𝕃𝕚𝕫𝕒𝕣𝕕 (𝕄𝕠𝕟𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣)

𝕃𝕧. 𝟛𝟡

ℕ𝕠𝕔𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕖 𝕃𝕚𝕫𝕒𝕣𝕕 (𝕄𝕠𝕟𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣)

𝕃𝕧. 𝟜𝟙

He stared down the tunnel, and one popped up after another, endless. He blinked a the mini-map. Only now, when they touched the ground, did it switch over to another layer. The underground layer.

And this was a stretch of pure red.

A heartbeat.

"Uh," said Avery.

Then the tunnel began to shake. The walls, the ceiling, the floors, all came alive.

Instantly he grabbed her and yanked her into him. It was lucky she was so small. When he hunched over and bear hugged her, he could pretty much wrap her fully, blocking her off with his back and arms. There was an ugly symphony of hisses, of shrieks, he saw those dark sleek snouts open wide, hundreds of them all at once—

Fuck.

He tried getting his Chains out, tried wrapping himself as quick as he could. But he had only gotten so much. An ocean of acid tar blasted him. His face was melting, his back was melting. His arms lit up in pain.

𝕎𝕒𝕣𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘! ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕝𝕥𝕙 𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕖𝕣 𝟝𝟘%!

𝕊𝕒𝕧𝕒𝕘𝕖 𝔹𝕠𝕕𝕪 𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕕

𝕍𝕚𝕥𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪 𝕚𝕟𝕔𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕖𝕕 𝟚𝟝%

𝕊𝕡𝕖𝕖𝕕 𝕚𝕟𝕔𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕖𝕕 𝟚𝟝%

𝕊𝕥𝕣𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕟𝕔𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕖𝕕 𝟚𝟝%

If he'd just been half a second slower with those Chains…

But he'd made it. The last of the acid sloughed off him. He narrowed his eyes.

My turn. "Hold on tight," he told Avery.

Inferno Cyclone!

He set his Chains to three feet long, barely enough to make a revolution in this cramped a space, and spun once, twice, thrice. Cruel iron cleaved easily through scale and flesh. A wind picked up in the tunnel, caught fire. Faster and faster he spun. The winds started howling in earnest, cackling, showering embers. He felt a second wave of tar batter at the edges of his rising storm but the fire took hold of it, ripped it apart, made it fuel, and grew hotter still.

Lizards threw themselves at the winds, got caught up in them, started spinning with them, spinning into those merciless scything Axe-blades. Storms were like fires. Small at first, but once they got going—good luck.

Wind and fire ripped down the tunnel on either side. Where they went, lizards melted. He sent one giant axe head spinning down his left, threw another down his right. He felt them scouring the walls, the ceilings, spinning back, scraping the stone clean.

When at last the wind and fire died down he sank to a knee, panting. Huh. There was no flesh left on his forearm. His back must be in even worse shape. Lucky thing—

𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕌𝕡!

𝔼𝕤𝕤𝕖𝕟𝕔𝕖 𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟝𝟘 -> 𝟝𝟙

A flash of white, and he was fully healed.

Underneath the carpet of Lizards, the tunnel was plain igneous rock. Magma must've flowed through here once. Avery stepped out from him, tottering, dizzy, and flushed.

"Wait," she gasped. "I think—I think I might be about to—ah, fuck—"

Then she slumped against the wall, and her eyes rolled back.

…

From just the spinning?

How could someone be so fragile and durable at once? She was Level Fifty. How low must her class's Vitality stat distribution be? It boggled the mind.

He crouched down, sat against the wall, and waited.

Eventually she woke up. She blinked at him for a bit, then flushed with embarrassment. "Did I really just…? Well," she said. "I'd say I want to crawl in a hole and die, but I'm already here, aren't I."

"Don't die," said Zane. "I put a lot of effort into saving you."

"Oh, pssh." She made a face. "Don't flatter yourself. I would've been fine."

He cocked a brow.

"Seriously! I can shrug off anything so long as I see it coming. I was about to redirect all that. Then this big dumb oaf snatched me from behind and spun me around 'til I blacked out."

"…" Ah.

She grinned playfully. "No, I get it. The thought was sweet. But I swear I'm more competent than I look… and seem… and act…really." She winced. "I can take care of myself. You just do you, alright?"

"Will do."

They picked a side and went for it.